Don't know where to start with ADR's

[cantwait4disney]

Our 180 day deadline is coming up in a few weeks and I don't know where to begin with making the reservations. Le Cellier's is on the list, along with Crystal Palace, Chef Mickey's, Cinderella's castle. We're going over Easter in 2008 so ADR's are critical! I feel like our week should be planned already and I haven't even begun! I'd like to eat breakfast at Crystal Palace & Chef Mickey's. Do you folks plan your touring around your ADR's or plan your ADR's around your touring? Also, is there a not-to-miss dining experience, either show or table service, that I must include?

Thank you all for the advice!

ETA: we're on the basic DP and we're a family of 5 (DH, myself, DD11, DS8 & DD6 with no finicky eaters)

 

[Mickeys_n_me]

I usually plan my touring first and then base where I am going to eat off of that. I use tour guide Mike so have my best days/night schedule and work off of that.

I save Chef Mickeys always for our last day to give the kids a going away party, plus we usually have an early flight home so we don't have much time to do much of the parks that day anyway.

Your ADR choices look good, most of my must haves are on there.

 

[scarlett24]

What we usually do, is to check out the park hours calendar on this site first. We map out which days to go to which parks based on hours, emh, parades, etc. After we have our schedule mapped out, we then plan our ADR's. Be sure to consider which shows and parades you want to see, and plan your meals around these times. Good luck and have fun.

 

[SandraVB79]

What we usually do, is to check out the park hours calendar on this site first. We map out which days to go to which parks based on hours, emh, parades, etc. After we have our schedule mapped out, we then plan our ADR's. Be sure to consider which shows and parades you want to see, and plan your meals around these times. Good luck and have fun.

That's what I also did: Find out park hours/ EMH/ Fireworks, ...
Put all that in an Excel-sheet.
Then I decided when I want to be at which park.
Then I added show/ parade times.

Apart from that, I had a list of all meals I wanted.

And then puzzle begins: try to fit park-restaurants in on the days you plan on being at that park. After that, resort restaurants, based on which resort is closest to the park you'll be at. E.g.: Kona on a day you are at MK, Spoodles on a MGM-Epcot day, ...

Then I call, most important/ hardest to get meal first, and so on. That way, if I don't get it on the day/ time I want it, I can start reworking my puzzle again.

I had to include tours, and dinner shows, they are not available on each day. I also had to keep in mind MNSSHP, and that Wishes/ Spectromagic is not on every day. All that made the puzzle a little more complicated. I also had to skip restaurants, because otherwise we wouldn't be able to eat the F&W foods
But in the end, I got everything I wanted. It took me some hours of puzzling in Excel. I made one phone call and got almost everything I wanted. Then TA made a phone call and got the ADRs I still needed. Then I made another phone call, because I wanted to add the Spirit of Aloha dinner show, and therefore had to move LTT to another day. 3 phone calls, and I have all I want!

Good luck with the planning

 

[Hopefully]

I plan which park which day first. I use the Disney site for hours and the UG crowd level predictors. Once I have figured that out, then I plan which restaurants we want. I either make a Theme Park reservation or a resort near where we will be.
I use the menus here, and at allearsnet.com to help
You are correct, at Easter Time ADR's are critical
Good Luck

 

[Hope73]

Honestly we don't use the emh. We have found them to be too crowded in the pm. We have used the am a few times.

I usually make res then that is he park we go to that day.

 

[hddanis]

Our 180 day deadline is coming up in a few weeks and I don't know where to begin with making the reservations. Le Cellier's is on the list, along with Crystal Palace, Chef Mickey's, Cinderella's castle. We're going over Easter in 2008 so ADR's are critical! I feel like our week should be planned already and I haven't even begun! I'd like to eat breakfast at Crystal Palace & Chef Mickey's. Do you folks plan your touring around your ADR's or plan your ADR's around your touring? Also, is there a not-to-miss dining experience, either show or table service, that I must include?

Thank you all for the advice!

ETA: we're on the basic DP and we're a family of 5 (DH, myself, DD11, DS8 & DD6 with no finicky eaters)

I plan our days first by putting them all into a spreadsheet (email me at hddanis@msn.com and I'd be happy to mail it to you) then I go in and add in the meals based on where we are that day. If I have trouble getting an ADR for where I want to eat one day, then I'll go in and readjust the days.

 

[Sinderelli]

I am the odd one out, as I make my reservations first, then plan my parks. We also don't use the late evening EMHs as my kids would sleep until noon he next day!! We always hit MK the first two days, so I plan my reservations in the monorail resort areas for those 2 nights.

OP, amother "must" for our family is dinner at 'Ohana. You may want to considr adding that one.

On our last night, I usually book Chef Mickeys, but found that after dinner we were too tired to go back into the parks- therefore we always missed the last night's fireworks. I think I solved that problem this time- I booked CM as a "welcome to Disney" FIRST night dinner. on our last night, we are eating at LTT in MK. The last dinner available for our night was 5:45 PM, so we will eat in the park and stay till closing. Hopefully no regrets!!

 

[MicheinMA]

I made the mistake of planning the bulk of our ADR's first and then started looking into EMH and which parks for which days. I had to change a few so we wouldn't be running around like crazy.

In the future I will have a game plan for the week and then do the ADR's.

Have fun!

 

[hoosll]

It is well worth an electronic spreadsheet or at least a piece of paper with park hours for your dates.

You will either avoid parks with EMH or go to them. I found that some people resist the rigidity of planning so I often go with my plan but make it sound like its spontaneous - "let's go to _____ today", "I'm hungry, we have a ressie at _______ if you are hungry, too.

After one day of steering things, usually my husband or friends ask what I have planned for them.

 

[bkyrdmoviemom]

When all of you have made ADR's, did you find you got pretty much everything you wanted, or did you have to change around a little bit. I'm wondering if I should make Plan A, Plan B, etc or make the call with my requests and see how the chips fall....?
any ideas?

 

[cantwait4disney]

Thank you for all the great advice. Looks like I've got some homework ahead of me, but hey, I'm planning for Disney, so it's pure joy! How will I know when the EMH are during Easter? Does Disney post that info this far in advance?

 

[weloveprincesses]

Sinderelli, I guess I'm an odd one too, I plan my adr's first, then that plans my park days...

I do have some sort of idea where I want to be on what day, but for the most part I line up what the important restaurants are to MY family. Not necessarily the hardest ones to get. We have yet to go to Chef Mickey's (can ya believe it?) simply because, while my children love him and always want to see him and his house, we are a princess family. (all girls, even the dog. Pity for DH) And even though we love Cinderella, we all agreed that we like seeing her just as much in Toontown as we do at breakfast.

I know there are lots of other people who can help much more than I can, but I thought I'd toss out another opinion. I'm also more of a kind of person that can't have too much planned out, so this seems to work for me. I suppose it could also be a detriment, as I also have a hard time making a decision.

However you go about it GOOD LUCK! I hope you get all the adr's you want.

Maggi

 

[Amirah95]

I agree with those who say plan your touring first and then plug in your ADRs.

 

[amery]

Since CRT & LeCellier will be the hardest ADR's to score, I would say to focus on getting them whenever they are available and let those ADR's dictate your touring for those days.

Since park admission is required for those, you might try seeing if you can get the CP ADR on the same day as CRT unless you have many days down there thus giving you a little more flexibility.

CM can be done on any day you choose and does not require park admission so that meal can fit in whenever.

Whatever you do, be consistent, persistent and pleasantly rude when you start calling and make sure that you double check when 180 days actually comes up. If you are not living in the EST, factor that in when you call.

Good luck!!

 

[cantwait4disney]

I got the 180 day mark from the CRO when I made the initial reserverations. That should be accurate, right? I've got some planning to do for sure. And I live in Central time zone, so I'll have to get up early. Reservations open at 7:00 a.m.est? Even on Sundays?

 

[amery]

7:00 EST on any day that ends in a "Y".

You would like to think that if the CRO gives you the 180 day callback date that it would be accurate but feel free to second guess them by plugging any preferred dining date into the calculator in this link:

http://pscalculator.net/pscalc.php

Since you are in CST, you need only start calling at 5:55 am and be prepared to call daily. I was lucky enough to get in on my 1st attempt and that was for a CRT ressie.

 

[cantwait4disney]

7:00 EST on any day that ends in a "Y".

You would like to think that if the CRO gives you the 180 day callback date that it would be accurate but feel free to second guess them by plugging any preferred dining date into the calculator in this link:

http://pscalculator.net/pscalc.php

Since you are in CST, you need only start calling at 5:55 am and be prepared to call daily. I was lucky enough to get in on my 1st attempt and that was for a CRT ressie.

Thank you for the calculator. I can happily report that the CRO was right on the money!

 

[tinkgurl]

Okay here's what we must do:
Chef Mickey's our first night.
Tony's Town Square our last night.
Luau at the Poly.
Concourse Steakhouse. (But that's closing )

Everything else, we just plan by what we like on the menu. Some days we plan what park we go to that day based on where the restaurant is.

 

[londonphillymel]

I was just reading this thread and saw your offer of a spreadsheet. I was hoping that you would email me a copy as well if you have time? We leave in about a month and I am starting to panic! Thanks so much!
Melissa

msmelissa64@aol.com